The Best Treatments for Neck Pain
Speak to A Chiropractor for the Best Treatment for Neck Pain
Effective Integrative Healthcare is trusted throughout Millersville and Crofton, MD for neck pain treatments due to the diverse range of therapeutic and chiropractic treatments at our disposal. We use a variety of medical, chiropractic, and therapeutic neck pain treatments at our clinic. We believe in a whole body approach, one that treats the condition and everything else equally.
Neck pain is disruptive to your daily routine, but it can also result in long-term health issues if not treated immediately. If you’re in pain, consider visiting the chiropractors at Effective Integrative Healthcare to ascertain whether our services can help you find relief. But how do you know whether you need to seek treatment? Visit us for neck pain treatments is severe and getting worse.
What Are the Common Causes for Neck Pain?
Neck pain can be caused by events both mundane and catastrophic. It’s true that a sports injury or frightening car accident can cause injuries that result in chronic pain. But did you know your everyday habits are contributing factors as well? Believe it or not, computer and smartphone usage can cause neck pain. These stiff necks are really just the result of poor posture and misuse and can be easily corrected with chiropractic care, physical therapy, and at-home stretching. But, beyond the mundane, cervical disc disease is the most common cause of neck pain. This condition is essentially created by an abnormality in one or more of the discs on your spine. Because these discs act as cushions along your spine, damaged and degenerated cervical discs lead to severe and unbearable pain if the condition is bad enough. Our chiropractors and massage therapists can treat all neck conditions by using a number of therapeutic treatments. Some of the most common we treat include:
- Cervical intervertebral disc injuries
- Cervical sprains
- Degenerative joint syndrome
- Facet joint sprain
- Whiplash
Why Shouldn’t I Neglect to Treat My Neck Pain?
Your neck is a critical part of your ability to function daily. For that reason, you shouldn’t delay if the neck pain has lingered for more than a few weeks. In fact, ignoring the problem can lead to more significant and increasingly painful conditions. Even though neck pain is common – roughly 80 percent of people experience it at some point – 20 to 50 percent deal with chronic neck pain. Beyond obvious symptoms like discomfort, neck pain can trigger other medical conditions, like chronic headaches, numbness, tingling, and arm weakness. Sleep difficulties are not uncommon, and it can become challenging to turn your head. How can you drive to work if you can’t turn your head? Effective Integrative Healthcare’s chiropractors recommend you visit our office as soon as it becomes clear the problem isn’t disappearing on its own.
What Natural or At-Home Neck Pain Treatments Are Available?
Before you come to see us, you should be aware there are plenty of at-home remedies you can use in combination with our treatments. Taking care of these things while at home can mean the difference between no pain and pain, and in some cases, can make the problem go away on its own. Ultimately, regardless of what is causing your pain, tightness is part of the problem. And you can do a lot of things to loosen your spine at home, including:
Monitor your phone usage: If you spend a lot of time talking on the phone – for business or personal conversations – consider investing in Bluetooth technology. Cradling your phone in your neck puts unnecessary strain on your cervical spine. Did you know the average smartphone user touches their phone 2,617 times a day and unlocks it 80 times per day? All this excessive smartphone use has led to a phenomenon called “text neck.” Additionally, did you know many individuals spend another five hours a day browsing Facebook, Instagram or Tinder each day? Swipe left on neck pain today!
Stretch: Prevent stiff neck or loosen a pained one by correctly stretching your spine. There are a number of stretches you can do that will help. You can roll your shoulders backward and down ten times, squeeze your shoulder blades ten times, hold your head into your car’s headrest for 30 seconds at a minimum, and stretch each ear to each shoulder ten times. These stretches will help combat whatever factors are impacting your musculoskeletal system.
Sleep comfortably: Make sure you’re sleeping on your side or back. Try to prevent yourself from rolling over onto your stomach by using pillows to block yourself. Sleeping on your stomach causes you to twist your head one way or another. Additionally, your stomach will sink into the bed if it isn’t firm enough. Side and back sleeping are the best ways to avoid causing further damage.
What Neck Pain Treatments Use Medical Procedures?
Whatever you do, surgery should only be considered as a last resort. Surgery is expensive, obviously, but that’s not why you should avoid it. Surgery comes with added risk factors and isn’t always effective at resolving the issue. For that reason, you should exhaust all therapeutic and chiropractic options prior to even considering a corrective surgical procedure. Effective Integrative Healthcare is more than a chiropractic clinic. We provide a host of innovative medical procedures designed to find non-surgical methods of treating neck pain. Our medical providers can use trigger point injections to precisely target areas in your body contributing to neck pain. Trigger point injections have been proven to be effective in reducing pain and inflammation immediately following injuries.
What Are My Therapeutic Neck Pain Treatment Options?
Maybe you’ve tried traditional medical therapies to rid yourself of chronic neck pain, but they aren’t working. Medical procedures aren’t the only neck pain treatments available to Crofton, MD or Millersville, MD patients. Therapeutic treatments can be used to augment existing therapies or replace ineffective ones. Effective Integrative Healthcare provides a wide range of neck pain treatments, any of which can bring much-needed relief and restore normalcy to your life. Ask our chiropractors, massage therapists, acupuncturists, and physical therapists about any of the following:
Acupuncture: Acupuncture provides varying levels of success in our patients. While it’s not for everyone, we have found patients suffering from a neck injury report a decrease in pain levels while they are recovering from their injury. Acupuncture can work quite well in combination with other medical treatments, as well as chiropractic spine adjustment therapies.
Massage therapy: Massage therapy targets knots and tightness that form along and to the sides of your spine. If you suffered a neck injury, chances are it is causing unforeseen consequences throughout the rest of your body. Knots are a consequence of neck pain. Treatments like massage therapy can help reduce the pain and inflammation that occur as a result of neck pain. Our Crofton, MD massage therapy can help loosen the muscles along your spine and ease some of the pain you’re feeling.
Physical therapy: As noted above, stretching is vital to recovery from chronic neck pain. Our physical therapists have years of experience working with patients to find efficient stretching and physical exercises that push their recovery forward. If you’re still feeling pain after acupuncture and massage therapy, give physical therapy a try. More importantly, physical therapy can identify secondary causes of neck pain, teach you to prevent future injuries, and strengthen weak areas that contributed to the injury in the first place.
Chiropractic: Using gentle force, our chiropractors prompt your spine to realign itself to where it should be. Sometimes neck pain can be effectively eradicated with successful chiropractic care. Effective Integrative Healthcare has a team of chiropractors, all of whom have years of experience readjusting misaligned spines.
Get Neck Treatments at Effective Integrative Healthcare
Effective Integrative Healthcare is proud of the work we do at our clinic. We believe each individual deserves to live a life free of pain, and our myriad of treatments are designed to do just that. Whether your neck pain is caused by lifestyle factors like excessive phone usage or an injury, our chiropractors can use massage therapy and physical therapy techniques to nurse you back to health and get your back on the road to recovery. Return to work and the basketball court and get back to living your life. To learn more about our neck pain treatments in Crofton, MD, give us a call today.